Unholy Terrors, page 3
I just killed my best friend’s fiancé.
Fuck my life.
“Anything else?” I ask as Widow looks Ash over, studying him to ensure he looks as messed up as his twin did after the fight. There’s a good chance someone at Prescott filmed the whole thing, so we’ve got to be damn careful with this.
“Let’s see how he swells up.” Widow turns and moves back over to the trunk, staring down at Aspen’s body and then reaching out to turn the corpse’s head toward him. “Good enough for now.”
The sound of a phone ringing gives us all pause.
It’s Aspen’s phone, buzzing from inside his suit jacket.
“Shit,” Ash growls, swiping blood from his lips as he moves over to the trunk and rummages around inside his dead twin’s jacket, withdrawing his brother’s cell and a set of keys in the process. He purses his lips into a thin line before answering the call. “Baby girl,” he greets, cleansing his voice entirely of his accent.
There’s a strange pause there where Ash’s brows draw in, and his mouth turns down in an even sharper frown.
“Get in your car and leave,” he commands imperiously, his entire body stiffening up, every muscle taut and ready for action as he listens to whatever Lemon has to say on the other end of the line. This is going to be weird as hell, isn’t it? Ash dating Lemon—for real this time. I don’t like the idea of it.
I cross my fingers together behind my head, watching him carefully, waiting. My eyes slide over to Widow, but he’s content to wait, picking up his baseball bat again and resting it on his shoulder as he stares back at me. In the moonlight, his jewel-toned hair shines in various shades of silver.
“No.” Ash’s voice snaps out like a whip. “Do not call the police.”
Chills skitter across my skin, more of those dark and ominous spider legs crawling over every inch of me. If Lem wants to call the cops—whom she hates with a passion—something must be really wrong.
But after talking to Emma Jean and Alexei, I know that’s a terrible idea. The Springfield police are very firmly tucked into Mayor Kelly’s pocket.
“Stay where you are; we’ll be right there.” Ash hands me the phone, and I lift it to my ear just in time to hear Lem give a shaky exhale. Things must be really bad for him to give up our cover like this.
“Hurry, Aspen. I’m really freaked out right now.” The way her voice warbles like that, thick with tears, even thicker with fear. Too scared to properly cry. Man, that kills me. As angry as I am at her, I’ve always got her back. I keep telling myself that she’s toxic, that I can’t save her from her own terrible choices, but somehow, I can’t seem to help myself either.
“Where are you?” I ask, not caring that she’s going to have questions about why I’m with her fiancé. Why he’d hand me his phone. Why I’d come with him to save her ass.
“Scarlett?” There are a million questions hiding in the sound of my name. I can sense Lemon’s hesitation (and annoyance) in my old leg injury, an ache in my bones that signals an incoming storm. Ah, shit. Right on top of the Aspen thing, on top of the hired gun thing.
When it rains, baby, it motherfuckin’ pours.
“Where are you?” I ask, already heading for the driver’s seat of the Chevelle and silently apologizing to Bohnes for adding yet another line item to his already very long list of Cleaning Up Scarlett Force’s Messes.
He gave me his car which is, I mean, it’s romantic as all get-out, and I bloodied it up with the corpse of the mayor’s favorite son. It occurs to me then as I reach for the door handle that I would be well and truly fucked without him. What’s the Crimson Crew without Kellin Bohnes? Who am I without Kellin Bohnes?
Maybe it isn’t because of Bohnes that we can’t have a real relationship. Maybe, just maybe, I am the problem.
I owe that man an apology; a blow job wouldn’t hurt either.
“Aspen knows.” That’s what she says to me, even as I’m worried about her and sweating bullets, ready to take a corpse to wherever she is and risk my future freedom and career, my whole life. “What are you doing with him, Scarlett?”
This last part she snaps out at me like a curse, jealousy coloring her voice an envious shade of jade.
“Where.” I repeat the question as a statement. I’m not playing around here. I want answers now.
“Address is in the text Aspen sent me,” she capitulates sourly, and I can just see the pouty shape her mouth must be making. That calms me a little. She can’t be in that much trouble if she’s mad at me, no can she? There’s a blip of hesitation there that makes me second-guess that idea. “Just … hurry up, please. Something is really wrong here.”
“We’ll be right there. Stay on the line with me, Lem.”
“Let me drive,” Ash says, grabbing my wrist before I can open the door. I let my gaze slide over to his, cold as ice.
“Nobody drives my fuckboy’s car but me.” The words come out in a growl, but then I hear Lemon suck in a sharp breath on the other end of the line, and I know we’ve got to haul ass. I yank the door open and slide in, taking comfort in Bohnes’ scent as it surrounds me.
Ash hops the hood—to show off, I guess—and then climbs into the passenger seat. Before I even really register what’s happening, Widow and his baseball bat are in the back seat.
Right.
Southside Avengers assemble, I guess.
Without a word, I hand the phone back to Ash and hit the throttle.
Scarlett
The distance from the track to the edge of the city where this mysterious address is would take the average driver about a half an hour. But for my bad self, driving that sexy-ass Chevy Chevelle? May as well be next-door. It takes me all of ten motherfucking minutes.
As we drive, Ash turns the speaker on so that I can hear her breathing, the sound of her soft footsteps as she paces nervously.
“Maybe I’m just going crazy?” she murmurs quietly, and the pacing stops. “But I swear, I heard my car door open and shut when I was on the back porch.” She exhales again as I tighten my hands on the wheel, making a right turn and heading down a long stretch of road with woods on either side.
There are houses here, but each lot is zoned for a minimum two acres. Most are still much larger and owned by one of three local logging companies.
“Just stay calm and stay inside; we’re almost there.” Ash stares out the windshield, the fingers of his left hand playing across the swollen and bloodied seam of his pretty mouth. Widow remains silent in the back seat, just in case. A trump card. Nobody has to know he’s with us.
“You were at the track?” she asks eventually, and I swear, I can feel the tension radiating off of Ash’s still and silent form.
“Just killing time while I waited for you,” he replies easily, and his words are so convincing that I almost believe them. Damn, he’s good. So good that it’s scary, actually.
“Killing time with Scarlett?” she asks, and I give a derisive snort in response. Even as I’m worried about her, I’m annoyed with her, too. This better not be like that one time she swore up and down that there was a shadow man living in her closet; she made me sleep over for a week until I proved her wrong.
“I don’t want your sleazy, pervert of a fiancé, Lem,” I snap back as the GPS on Aspen’s phone alerts us that our destination is coming up on the right. What the hell is this place anyway?
“Really? Because that’s not what I’ve heard.” Her voice is low, but that green envy is now limned with cherry-red rage. “Tuesday said she saw you two making out at Bohnes’ party—right after you pushed me into the mud and left me to walk miles down the road by myself. Want to explain that, huh?”
Ash glances my way, and I meet his eyes briefly, noting the spark of fear in them before he blinks it away. He continues to trace his bloody mouth with a single finger, staring at the dash in thought.
“You know about that and still, you want to marry the guy?” I snap back at her, and she just gives a soft, haughty laugh in response.
“Aspen, do you love me, baby?” she asks, rather than responding to my question.
“Of course, sweetheart,” he purrs, biting onto his thumbnail and gritting his teeth. “You know what I promised you: after we’re married, no more fooling around.”
Widow lets out a small sound from the back seat, one that clearly says he isn’t impressed by any of this. All the while, Aspen lies dead and bloody in the trunk. Such is a typical Saturday night in South Prescott.
“Just hurry up, baby.” Lemon’s voice softens slightly. “We can talk about this all later. Trust me, I know better than anyone how Scarlett can be.”
I just can’t help myself; I throw another insult back at her.
If only I hadn’t done that.
Life is full of shit like that, you know?
What if I hadn’t clapped back for once in my life? What if I’d tried to be nicer, more understanding? What if I’d let my pride and hurt feelings go just this one time?
What-ifs are one of the most deadly and morose loops a person can travel. They never end; there is no finish line, no checkered flag to wave. It’s a race full of losers that I refuse to participate in.
At least, I always thought I was strong enough to resist such a pull.
“How I can be? Maybe if you weren’t so goddamn sad and desperate, your man wouldn’t have come to the track tonight looking for me?” Looking to shoot me and then rape my bleeding body, to be exact. None of which is her fault, I know that. But here she is on the phone defending Aspen Kelly—the real Aspen Kelly, not the shiny new one sitting in the passenger seat—when the guy came at me intending to ruin or even take my life.
“You can’t control me anymore, Scarlett. I know that’s hard for you to accept. Get over it.”
Lemon hangs up the phone as I make the right turn onto the curving dirt driveway that winds through the woods and up to a large house with a wraparound porch.
“Shouldn’t you be jumping in more?” I ask, and Ash just sighs, tossing the phone into one of the Chevelle’s cupholders.
“If Aspen were here, in this same situation, he’d find it amusing. He’d encourage the two of you to bicker and fight over him and then he’d go home and masturbate to thoughts of it.” Ash looks down at the disheveled state of his suit and sighs heavily. “Trust me: if I know how to do anything well in this life, it’s how to play my brother.”
He opens the door before I even come to a complete stop and hops out.
“Whoa, who owns the Ferrari?” Widow asks as I turn off the Chevelle’s engine and we get out together. I scan the woods first before I return my attention to the vintage yellow beauty parked beside us.
Aspen pauses halfway up the porch steps and glances back, face schooled into careful disdain.
“I bought it as a gift—for my fiancée.” He emphasizes this last part, removing the keys he took from Aspen’s jacket pocket so that he can unlock the house’s front door. “Just like I bought this house,” he adds, and then he’s heading inside.
Jesus.
The real Aspen bought Lemon a yellow ’76 Ferrari 308 GTB, a two-hundred thou gift, easy.
I wet my lips with my tongue.
“Let’s go.” I turn away and head up the steps with Widow hot on my heels, but not before turning and looking out at the woods again. Just as I felt that strange sense of other when I approached the side door at my house earlier, I feel it here.
Lem’s right: someone is watching us from the woods.
We find Ash and Lemon upstairs in one of the house’s empty bedrooms. His arms are around her and he’s stroking her hair back, murmuring soft words under his breath. His eyes meet mine above her head, and a hot flash of annoyance takes over me.
He’s mine, goddamn it.
The thought hits me like a gut punch, and I’m immediately annoyed with myself. Will he have to fuck her? Would he, even if he should in order to keep up appearances? I have no idea.
Lemon pulls away from Ash, gazing up at him with undying devotion. With a sigh, I cross my arms over my chest. I’ve seen this look before, many times. Besides that, does she not realize there’s something off about Ash the way I did when I was around Aspen?
Leave it to us to each pick one guy in a set of twins. To my credit, I picked the better of the two. Not sure either is (or was, I guess) a smart choice whatsoever.
“Scarlett.” She clings to Ash’s arm, dressed and styled differently than I’m used to. Her short, blond hair is in this slick wave, like some 1920s movie star while her dress is short and tight, shiny and silver and flattering. Expensive. “And … Widow?” she asks, looking back up at Ash in question.
He doesn’t bother to respond to her. Instead, he moves away from her and over to one of the windows.
“What is he doing here?” Lemon asks, getting defensive as she studies the three of us with a questioning look on her face.
We’re in a rough state, to be sure. Widow is fucked-up and carrying a bloody baseball bat. I’m sure I’ve got blood speckles here and there, a knife clutched in one hand. Aspen’s pants are wet with blood—though it’s hard to tell since they’re black—and his right eye is beginning to swell shut.
Surely, she’s wondering what happened between us before we jetted over here to rescue her ass. With a roll of her eyes, she moves back over to stand beside Ash, frowning as she notices the Chevelle parked beside her sexy new Ferrari.
“Bohnes’ car, really?” She turns to look at me, her eyes dark with unspoken accusations.
“We rushed over here together to save you,” I breathe, moving further into the room to stand beside Ash. He’s just staring out the window, like he can sense the same thing that both Lemon and I did.
Someone is out there, creeping around in the woods.
Moonlight drips through the canopy here and there, dotting the darkness with silver, and a heavy fog has settled over the landscape, obscuring the repeating lines of tree trunks and the bushy thickets of blackberries.
“Why don’t we just get the fuck out of here?” Widow asks, moving up to peer out the window, too. “Before we get into trouble.”
“There are at least a half-dozen men out there,” Ash murmurs, and then he’s biting his thumbnail again which is sort of cute since I have the same habit. His eyes flick my way, and I raise my brows. How could he possibly know that?
But then I see them, moving toward the house from various directions.
Why didn’t they come for us when we were outside? They could’ve put rounds through each of our skulls before we were even fully aware of the danger present. And why leave Lemon in the house alone all this time?
Because they were waiting for someone.
More than likely, they were waiting for Aspen Kelly.
“Wait here.” Ash pulls away from Lemon, and she makes a small sound of protest. The look he throws back at her is dripping with dominion and sovereignty, like he’s a prince or something. “Wait.” He grinds his teeth together and then takes off down the stairs by himself.
Pretty sure he just came to the same conclusion that I did.
I smell a plot.
“Let’s go,” I command, making a split-second decision. I move over to the window and push it up, gesturing out at the roof. “We can use the porch railing to climb down.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Lem declares obstinately, crossing her arms over her small breasts and looking at me like I’m the enemy instead of her best friend of thirteen years. “Aspen will handle this.” She smirks at me. “Do you know what this place is, Scar? It’s my future home.”
I resist the urge to cunt punch her, toss her over my shoulder, and carry her out of here. I have a really bad feeling about this.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, darling, but I don’t give two fucks. Let’s go.” When I move forward to grab her arm, she jerks away from me, eyes flashing with hurt.
“Aspen is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Why can’t you just be happy for me and support me?” I take another step forward and she moves back again. “Instead, you humiliate me in front of the whole school, crash my engagement party, and try to steal my man when you’ve clearly got a whole collection of dick going on.”
She gestures loosely in Widow’s direction, but he isn’t paying any attention to her. Instead, he’s positioned near the bedroom door, back to the wall, head turned to one side as he listens for any activity from downstairs.
The fact that we haven’t heard anything yet must mean that I was right: those men, whoever they are, were waiting for Aspen.
Aspen, who’s dead in Bohnes’ trunk.
What a mess.
“Listen to me, Lem,” I begin, getting my Queen of the Crimson Crew voice on. “If you just climb out onto the roof and get into the car, I’ll let you insult me as much as you want. I’ll even apologize for kissing Aspen. How does that sound?”
She looks askance at me, all glamoured up and looking like a different person altogether. In my heart, I wish that Aspen had loved Lemon the way he’d proclaimed. Truly, all I’ve ever wanted was for her to be happy.
She opens her mouth to respond and then pauses as we hear the sound of footsteps on the stairs.
“It’s Aspen,” Widow breathes, and we all go still, waiting, watching.
He appears in the doorway, dark eyes wide, breathing heavy.
Our gazes meet, and then there’s another set of footsteps on the stairs followed by two more.
Ash moves into the room, reaching into his suit jacket and removing a Ruger. Whether it’s the same gun he pointed at Widow on the track that day or his dead brother’s, I’m not sure. He holds it down by his side, glancing over his shoulder as a man appears in the doorway.
“Baby, what’s—” Lemon starts, but then Ash is turning and lifting the weapon up with two steady hands. He shoots the guy—whoever he is—right between the eyes, dropping him to the beautiful hardwood floors beneath our feet.
