I told him as much.
It was the only time he praised me for questioning him, then claimed it’s a tactic. A tactic that allows him to stay one step ahead, fleeing the moment Willard’s or Noretto’s men get too close for comfort...
It’s brilliant, but moronic at the same time. I’ve noticed lately that a lot of things Vaughn says either don’t make much sense or contradict things he said earlier.
The night Noretto let me out of his house and into Vaughn’s car, I begged Vaughn to hide me somewhere Blaze could never find me.
I was petrified of the man. Not because he hurt me—he did no such thing. He was the perfect gentleman and host for my entire stay at his mansion. I was scared because of what he represented. Mafia. Crime. Murders. Imprisonment.
“You should take a nap while I make dinner,” I suggest.
“I’m not tired,” Vaughn lies smoothly, turning his wheelchair around after closing the drapes.
He snatches the remote and flicks on the TV that’s connected to a wide-lens camera on the windowsill. It overlooks the street and the decoy apartment, so Vaughn doesn’t miss a thing while he’s not staring out the window.
“It’s odd,” he mutters, tapping his fingers against the wheelchair’s armrest. “They should’ve found us by now. It doesn’t usually take them this long.”
Agree to disagree.
We’ve moved six times in the past two months, and not one instance felt like a true breach of our location. I keep expecting armed men dressed in black to barge into our fake apartment in the middle of the night.
But it’s not like that at all.
Vaughn’s never spotted a familiar face out on the street. He simply sees something he considers out of place and makes us leave right away.
First, there was a black BMW parked outside the small, run-down hotel across the street from the loft we were staying in. Two men sat inside, chatting. They were dressed in dark suits and drank takeout coffee, paying the world passing them by little attention.
Vaughn watched them for twenty minutes, growing more agitated. Sweat beaded at his hairline. His knuckles turned white with how hard he gouged his fingers into his numb knees, teeth scraping together.
Nothing in the scene had changed when he spun his wheelchair around and looked me dead in the eye.
“Time to go,”he barked, already packing his scarce equipment in a flourish.
He’d gone over the evacuation plan with me every night since we left Noretto’s, drilling every step into my head until I could recite it anytime he shook me awake in the middle of the night. Sixty seconds is all it took us to pack.
We never really unpack.
Our second escape was because an unknown number called Vaughn’s new cell twice in a row. Next time he didn’t even bother explaining, just threw a“You don’t want to know”at me while gathering his equipment.
But I did want to know, damn it.
He gave me more information about our recent move from Kentucky to Ohio. We left because he spotted three suspicious-looking men dressed in black walking down the street. It was convincing at the time. My heart threatened me with a coronary while we fled, but once we’d arrived here and I had time to calm down, I realized that the situation could’ve been easily explained.
It was Saturday morning, past two am. Those men were probably drunk, coming back from a night out...
If that’s the case, it means Vaughn’s paranoid. That maybe no one’s looking for us at all and he’s lost the plot.
Why would anyone be after us? That’s the million-dollar question that fills my days. Vaughn did exactly what Octavius and Blaze wanted. They have the mysterious evidence Vaughn refuses to tell me more about, so why look for us?
It doesn’t make sense.
“I learned the hard way never to trust Noretto or Grey,”he scoffed, shaking his head when I broached the subject.“Never trust a criminal, Bianca.”Running a heavy hand down his face,he huffed.“Besides, even if those two leave me alone, Willard won’t let me live. He doesn’t let anyone who hurts Hailey live, and I’ve hurt her twice now.”
For a reason I’ll never understand, instead of a chill sliding down my spine at his words, I felt a pleasant warmness spread through my insides. Knowing a man would kill for a girl shouldn’t be attractive. It fuckingshouldn’t. It’s sick, twisted, plain wrong, but... it’s thrilling.
How much does Carter love Hailey if he protects her so fiercely? How would it feel to be so loved? So cherished that any harm coming your way is met with indescribable wrath?
I’ll never know. It’s the kind of devotion I can only dream about. I didn’t deserve the love and care of my parents, wasn’t good enough for my ex-boyfriends...
