Page 16 of Lethal Weakness

Her brown curls are piled above her pillow, and Avery’s blonde locks are scattered across her face and her mom’s.

They look comfortable, as if they’ve only ever slept this way, curled up in the center of a bed as one being.

It’s not her beauty that draws me in, though I can admit I’m not blind to it… It’s her pure nature. The warmth and safety she provides for her child. It’s almost unfathomable to see such good in my line of work.

I’ve gotten used to being surrounded by evil. Behaving like the beast.

It’s exactly why I need to stop seeking out the glimpses of their joy. Being near them is distracting me.

But not knowing everything about them is distracting me even more.

I should be doing recon at the mansion on the hill. I’ve studied the guard schedule, memorizing it down to the minute, and my next big task is to get inside undetected, but I can’t do that when I’d rather spend my nights watching my neighbors.

Linden has been on edge since she moved in, and I suspect her ex is the culprit, but it’s really none of my business.

I don’t belong near them.

Civilian issues don’t concern me.

My job is to take down the wolves hiding in sheep’s clothing. The ones that the government is too scared to handle. Or are involved in.

Like Edmund and Merrill Scott.

Do you know what your in-laws are doing, Linden?

Chapter Six

Linden

Athroat clears behind me, and I jump.

I had a dream about the man in the mask last night. He was standing at the foot of my bed, looking bigger than the room, staring at me from the cutout around his eyes, the only spot that exposed his flesh.

His humanity.

His gaze was infiltrating my sleep, disrupting my dreams, and I’ve been jumpy all day.

Ms. Chaney and Ms. Harris took turns startling me while I cleaned their houses, and now, Avery is busy playing on the porch with chalk while I pull weeds, and I never heard anyone walk up behind me.

“I got some of your mail in my mailbox,” Jack says from across the fence.

The sun is shining right into my eyes when I turn to face him, forcing me to step closer until his height shadows my face.

“Thanks,” I murmur, staring up at him as he hands me an envelope.

Under his hat, his eyes are so dark that the brown almost appears black. He’s so serious-looking, but he has a handsome face. A pronounced brow, an angular jaw, and a strong nose that might’ve been straight once but has been broken a few times. His skin is olive-toned, almost making him look bronzed.

Avery and I are both fair-skinned with freckles, and it’s not close enough to summer for the sun to have given me any type of color.

“Are you Italian?” I ask without thinking as I glance at the nondescript envelope with my name on it.

“No.”

“Oh, sorry. You just look sun-kissed already.”

He shifts uncomfortably at my observation, and I sense the awkwardness I brought on. “Uh, thanks again.” I wave goodbye with the letter in my hand and retreat.

His voice stops me when I’m halfway back to my house. “My mother was part Lakota.”