“Your father would be ashamed of you,” Ricci choked out.
Kade let out a laugh. “Here’s the thing, I don’t give a flying fuck what my old man would think. He was a fool for getting into bed with you. I am just cleaning up his mess.”
Kade turned to Evelyn. “Let me know when it’s time to take out the trash.”
A small smirk crossed her lips before Kade walked out of the room.
“I’ll see you in Hell, Ghost!” Ricci shouted.
The door slammed behind Kade, leaving Evelyn and me alone with Ricci once more. Evelyn stood back in front of Ricci and glanced over at me before grabbing the handgun out of its holster at the waistband of her cargo pants. She aimed the gun at Ricci. I moved closer; I needed to be as close as possible when Ricci took his last breath.
“Oh, this is comical.” Ricci laughed. “There’s no way you have the stomach to shoot me. What was it your mother always said?” He paused and looked up as if he were deep in thought. “Oh, that’s right, ‘stay in the shadows.’ So why don’t you go and do that? Eh?”
Before he could continue, Phantom pulled the trigger. The sound of the shot echoed in the small room as the bullet pierced through his trachea. His body jerked from the impact. Ricci began choking as blood flooded the bullet wound.
“I’m done listening to you run your mouth. That’s for my mother!” Phantom screamed.
Phantom unsheathed her knife and stabbed him in the stomach.
“And this,” she pushed the knife further into Ricci’s abdomen, “is for Aaron.”
My heart sank at hearing my best friend’s name. Ricci gasped from the impact, more blood spilling from his neck and his mouth. Phantom removed the knife and wiped the blood-covered blade on her pants. She stepped aside. I took the handgun from my side and shot Ricci three times in the heart.
“And that is for Lily. And anyone who has been hurt by or because of you.” Smoke filtered out of the barrel of the gun as I slowly lowered my arm to my side.
Ricci slumped over in his seat as blood began to pool around him. Just like that, Anthony Ricci was dead, and I was no closer to finding Lily. I felt empty, but could sense rage simmering somewhere deeper inside me. I thought I would feel satisfaction with Ricci dead, but instead, I only felt more frustrated and had more questions.
I walked out of the interrogation room feeling queasy. As if sensing my distress, Machine walked over to me and placed a hand on my shoulder.
“You okay?” he asked quietly, squeezing gently.
I nodded my head, not wanting to give away the truth; I was a mess. He leaned in closer, his hazel eyes seeming to see into my soul.
“I’m going to pretend that you didn’t just lie straight to my face.” He looked over my shoulder and then back down to me. “I need to take care of the rest of this. I’ll meet you at home, okay?”
I nodded and watched as he walked away. Tears stung my eyes. Buddha walked over and embraced me in one of his signature hugs.
“It’s okay, B. It’s over now,” he said.
But I knew he was wrong. This fight was just beginning.
THIRTY
MACHINE
I spent the rest of the day working with Kade to stage Ricci’s body for the authorities to find, strategically making it look like he was attacked in his own home and being careful not to leave any prints or forensics. This was my specialty. I knew how to manipulate a crime scene to lead the police to someone other than ourselves.
After getting cleaned up at RSS and finalizing a few things, I decided to go to the store to grab more baking ingredients for Badger. Lord knew she was going to go through them quickly.
The door chirped as I walked through the threshold of the penthouse. As I’d imagined, the air smelled of something sweet. Lucy looked up from her bed near the couch, huffed, and lay back down. Badger must have worn her out by playing with her.
When I turned the corner, Badger was in the middle of frosting a cake. She had flour dusting her face and apron. I smiled, enjoying seeing her in her element. The island was covered in pies, cookies, loaves of banana bread, and chocolate truffles. I placed the groceries on the counter and walked behind Badger, wrapping my arms around her waist.
“Well, someone has been busy.” I pressed a kiss under her ear, making her shiver.
“Well, we need quite a bit for the funeral tomorrow,” she said, focusing on making the frosting as smooth as possible on the top of the cake.
I looked around the kitchen. “I think there’s enough, Bunny.”
