I wondered how quickly I could cover her mouth. If I was fast enough, she wouldn't even squeak. No. Stop! I bit my tongue, forcing logic into my skull. She knows I'm a hitman. How was that possible? I had to figure out what was going on before I did anything rash.
“Why would you say something like that?” I asked, my smile forced and stiff.
Marina looked at my knuckles, then to the doorway. Finally, she inhaled and met my stare. “I saw you murder Frank Montego. That day in the park, I watched everything you did.”
“And so,” I whispered, “You assume that makes me a hitman?” Not that it matters, I realized. If she actually saw me pull the trigger, she knows I'm a murderer. That was just as condemning.
She shook her head, long threads of hair tickling her shoulders. “No, the news told me that part.”
The skin on my face was wooden. Smiling was getting harder. “Then, isn't coming here to meet me a little... risky?”
Marina licked her bottom lip. It was the first sign of her nerves. “Probably. But I didn't have a choice. You're the only one who can help me.”
Inching a foot forward, I judged the gap between her face and my palms. “Why would I help you?”
“Because I have money,” she blurted. She saw it, then; I could tell from the way her pupils shrank. Marina recognized what I was considering. “Stop! You can't hurt me.”
I took another step. My fingers flexed at my hips. “I don't have much choice.” I have to keep us safe. Jacob and I... we can't let everything end here.
This girl was a liability.
What else could I do but silence her?
Maybe jumping to murder was crazy, but Marina had put me in an awful position. It only took one loose end, and my world—Jacob's world—would come undone.
No one who'd hired us as had ever seen our faces. They knew us as the Jackals, contacted us through the anonymity of the internet. The only people who could identify us were the ones about to take their last breath.
Marina had become one of them.
It was...
It was the only way.
The dip on her throat fluttered. Her hands came up, mine came down. I squeezed her jaw, but her voice spilled faster. I should have been lightning. Had months of inaction made me slow?
Or... maybe I'd hesitated.
“They'll know!” she gasped, eyes all white and popping.
Freezing, I kept my grip on her face. One palm hovered over her lips, not touching. “What?”
“If I die, if anything happens to me, the police will know!” Her ribs were swaying, lungs struggling to fit both air and panic at the same time. “It won't be clean!”
Clean, I mused to myself. Shaking with unused adrenaline, I eased my fingers off of her. I hadn't left a mark. I knew better than that. “Tell me, right now, how in the fuck anyone would know about this. Did you tell the cops about me?”
Marina's face scrunched in disgust. “Of course not. I'm not an idiot.” She saw the way I folded my arms, felt my doubt. “Okay, yes, I know that coming to see you was dangerous.”
“Not was. Is.”
Lifting her chin, she pressed on. Her composure was returning. “I wrote a letter. I detailed the entire murder of Frank Montego, what I saw you do. I also said that if anything happened to me, that I was coming to this bar, and the police should know it meant you were the one who'd killed me.”
I went cold. This girl, she'd actually started something I couldn't prevent. If she'd really written such a letter, who had it? Where was it? Could it be enough information to finger me for Frank's murder?
Frustration sank into my blood. Narrowing my eyes, I turned away from her. “Please excuse me a moment.”
“Where are you going?” she asked, starting to follow me.
A single, sharp glare over my shoulder made her go rigid. “Don't worry. I'll be back to talk with you very soon. Go make yourself a drink, get comfortable.”
“But you will be back?”
Hunching my shoulders, I felt my empty pockets and begged for a gun. “You won't even miss me.”
- Chapter 4 -
Marina
The nerves in my fingers were cold. No part of my body wanted to behave like it should.
Kite's hands, they'd been as deadly as knives. But the worst part hadn't been how he'd grabbed me, it had been his projection of fury.
He was more dangerous than I'd imagined. Something else was bothering me, though—something that chewed at the base of my brain. How was it possible for a killer—an actual killer... to be so damn handsome?
His jaw was powerful, angular. And those black eyes, even as they'd burned me up, they'd startled a deep part of me that itched for more. His energy had made my breath catch, and my tongue was buttery and numb.
A gorgeous man; a guy who could be a model!
And he'd been on the verge of ending my life.
It had taken all my strength to cry out before it was too late. The letter wasn't a lie, I'd put it together after a few days spent staking out the bar. I'd learned Kite's last name was Lawson, and that his best friend was Jacob Fallow. They owned the Corner Velvet together.