He steps into my path, his hands on my arms. I catch his forearm, brace my feet, and prepare to fight. “Hands off,” I warn, “or I swear to you, my knee will be your nightmare.”
“If you do this, you will go to jail,” he warns. “Then I’ll blame Kane for ever pulling you into his world. I’ll go after him and he’ll come after me and we’ll destroy each other. You won’t be able to stop it.” He releases me.
“God, you’d probably be that stupid.” I draw a breath. “And if he’s dead?” I dare, when I swore to myself I wouldn’t go there.
“Right now, you have to think about him coming home. You have to think about how what you do affects both of you. And do you really want to end up behind bars and find out you killed the wrong person? Let’s go have coffee and talk.”
“No coffee. None of your conversation. I’ll leave. I’m going back to the airport. But if anything happens to Kane, I’ll go through you to get to Pocher if I have to, Andrew.” I turn away from him, intent on walking to Kane’s car, when all of the sudden not one but four vehicles come into view, all charging toward us.
I pull my weapon and Andrew is instantly by my side doing the same, and just in time, too. We’re surrounded by those very same vehicles one minute, and the next, there’s a good half dozen guns pointed at us, and the only thing that checks my adrenaline is that one of them, the one directly in front of me, is held by a man I know. He’s Kane’s man. They’re all Kane’s men.
“Put the fucking gun down, Enrique,” I snap. “I’m not in the mood for this shit.”
“What is this, Lilah?” Andrew retorts tersely.
“You need to get in the car with me, Lilah,” Enrique orders, ignoring Andrew.
“What was that? I need to shoot you?” I ask. “Right. Okay. I really need to shoot someone right now. And we both know you’re not stupid enough to shoot me.”
“But I will shoot your brother,” Enrique counters. “Kane doesn’t give a fuck what happens to him.”
“Kane cares about what I care about, but if anything happens to Andrew, you’ll be too dead to find out what Kane will do to you.”
“Kit told us to keep you from doing something stupid,” he replies. “At all costs.”
I lower my weapon. “Has he talked to Kane?”
Enrique’s lips press together and he lowers his weapon, motioning for everyone to do the same. “If he has, he hasn’t told me. We’re supposed to take you to your house and keep you there until we hear more.”
“Yeah, fuck Kit,” I say. “And you, too, Enrique. Coming at me with guns was just plain dumb. And Andrew’s the chief of police, you idiot.”
“We were trying to keep you from doing something stupid.” He motions to Andrew. “He can appreciate that.”
“Get your bitch-ass men back in their cars,” I snap. I glance at Andrew, who’s still holding his weapon on Enrique. “Put it up, Andrew.”
His cellphone rings and his jaw clenches. He holsters his weapon and grabs his phone, answering with, “Chief Love.” He listens a moment and then says, “We’ll be right there.” He hangs up. “We have another murder right here in the Hamptons. Let’s go.”
Another murder.
He means what I can assume will be another dead bride. And the last thing I’m doing right now is standing over a dead bride when my future husband’s missing. “You’re the big bad police chief.” I motion to Enrique. “I just told him so. You can handle it on your own.”
“It’s not the bride this time. It’s the groom. If the dead brides were a message for you, Lilah, a dead groom at the same time Kane is missing seems a pretty clear invitation for you to join me.”
CHAPTER TWO
I don’t like games.
At all.
And games don’t like me.
I once pulled my gun while playing Monopoly. Kane was amused. Kit was not, considering I was aiming at him. But he gave me my damn prime land back.
As for this game—and this is a game—it won’t end well for whoever is forcing me to play.
But after the jar of pig’s blood left for me at the first crime scene, I can’t ignore the premise that the dead groom could be another message intended for me. And like a good little puppet, I’m doing exactly what the killer wants. I glance in my brother’s direction. “I’ll follow you to the scene.” My attention shifts to Enrique as I add, “Leave now before you end up in jail. And don’t follow me or I really will shoot you. I won’t feel bad about it, either.”
I get in my car.
Thankfully, Andrew does the same of his.