12
Hayley
Ilooked up as the screen door opened to the pool area, watching as Damien strode outside with Miles, Tyrone, and Drake.
“Surprised you let him into the house,” I commented as I looked up at Damien through my shades.
He shrugged. “Need information from him,” he told me. “How’s your neck?”
I shrugged as well. “Been better,” I carelessly answered, “but it’s healing.” A dark look passed through Damien’s eyes, but he didn’t say anything.
“The fuck happened to you?” Drake asked as he ran his eyes over the hand-shaped bruises on my neck.
I smirked. “Damien and I got a little too kinky last night,” I lied, making Damien bark out a laugh at my smart-ass remark. Miles coughed to hide his laugh, and I saw Tyrone’s lips twitch with a smirk.
Drake scowled at my answer. I stepped out of the pool and took the towel Damien instantly held out to me and wrapped it around me. “So, what’s going on?” I asked as I moved to sit on one of the loungers, only for Damien to wrap an arm around me and tug me down between his legs on the lounger he was sitting on.
“Mark is missing,” Drake informed us. “Body is gone. No trace of it. Someone got rid of him.”
“An informant told me that the Carters are involved in all of this shit somehow,” Tyrone spoke up.
“The Carters is the last fucking thing we need,” Damien grumbled distastefully.
I vaguely remembered Lacie telling me something about the Carters when she had come running to me for help, and I wondered if maybe she had written something in her journal entries about them. She used to always write in a journal.
I turned my head to kiss Damien on the cheek. “I’m going to put on some clothes,” I told him as I stood up.
Once I was in mine and Damien’s room, I changed into a pair of shorts and a ribbed tank top and then began searching through all my things for Lacie’s things that I had kept.
She had a habit of writing things down when she was stressed, and I remember her sobbing about someone named Diego. I hadn’t thought much of it at the time, but I knew she would have written about him if she found the need to cry over him. At the time, I’d thought maybe he was just someone that Drake had killed that she’d known the name of.
Knowing the name’s of your man’s victims made shit a lot harder to deal with.
I finally found her notebook, and I sat on the edge of the bed, opening it up. Instantly, a picture fell out onto my lap.
It was Lacie and a Hispanic guy. She was smiling as he pressed a kiss to her temple. She looked healthy in the picture. Her blonde hair was in loose ringlets around her face, and her make-up was done to perfection. His arms were lovingly wrapped around her waist.
I flipped it over to the back, hoping it would tell me something about the man she was with in the picture.
Marshalls
Beside the name, she had written a date.
I set the picture beside me on the bed and flipped through the pages of her journal, looking for Diego’s name.
The first page I found was a letter from him that he had written in the small notebook.
Lacie,
I don’t know if you will find this in time. He is keeping us separated—said you will ruin me, that you are a distraction.
Please stay far away from my home, amor. He is off the rails, and I do not want you to get hurt. I will come get you when I can, but until then, continue staying with Drake. He can keep you protected.
I love you, Lacie.
Please stay safe.
I turned the page and found an ultrasound picture taped to the back. And then I saw her next journal entry, explaining her pregnancy.