Page 31 of Vile Bastards
Once the majority of the people are cleared away, I head across the street and film the notices, pausing next to an old man who’s sitting on the ground with a leather suitcase that’s certainly seen better days.
“Did you just get evicted from here?” I ask him, and he snorts.
“Better that than dead,” he grumbles, giving me a once-over. “Who the fuck are you?” I reach into my pocket and withdraw my wallet. The man’s eyes glitter as I remove several bills and toss them into his lap.
“Explain.”
He snorts again and pockets the money, making a show of counting it first as I sigh dramatically and squat down next to him. It won’t do to lose my temper on a homeless man. Well, Aspen would certainly do something like that. He once killed a drunk in an alley for no other reason than he was bored.
I buried the body through tears and learned to hate myself more deeply than I ever could’ve imagined. That was on our thirteenth birthday, I believe. Or maybe it was the day after? Regardless, it was its own little slice of hell.
“Just because I gave you money, that doesn’t mean I’m nice.” I stare the man down until he finally pockets the cash, and then grunts at me like an animal.
“This guy from the thirteenth floor, him and his girlfriend disappeared last week. They were the only ones protesting this shit, and they’re gone now.” The man shrugs. “Probably dead and buried. Why? You a reporter or something?”
I smile at him, and it’s nice to see that he shudders and recoils in response. This man here has the Prescott neighborhood in his blood, and he’s scared of me? I must really look like my brother or … maybe that was just me in there all along?
“Journalist,” I correct, rising to my feet and heading back to the Cobra.
I lock the doors and get out the new burner phone I purchased yesterday, shooting off a quick text to Bohnes. I’ve forced myself to memorize his number. Very likely, my life depends on it.
I need the number for that journalist, Emma Jean. Can you ask Scarlett for it and send it to me?
I almost ask him to arrange a meeting between me and Scarlett.
But I don’t. I can’t. I ditched the last burner phone, and I’m resisting the urge to text her from this new one, just in case.
I thought I could fly to Tokyo and leave her behind forever, cherish the memory of her and be satisfied that she was safe from both my father and Aspen. But now? Now, I don’t think so.
I want Scarlett with an intensity that scares me because I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I will do anything to get and keep her.
Literally. Fucking. Anything.
I groan and put the phone up against my forehead, closing my eyes and breathing through that ethereal fog that’s clouding my head and heart. Obsession. It’s overflowing from inside of me, and I don’t know what to do with it.
In the end, I force myself to turn the burner phone off, tucking it inside the dash for later, and then I head back to the strip club.
They’re all still there—my father, Chet Archer, Ernest Bolin—helping my dad drink off his guilt about his hated son’s suicide.
“Aspen! You’re back.” Chet grins and gestures at a girl laid out on the edge of the stage, a shot glass between her tits. “Have a body shot and relax.”
Even as I’m struggling with the urge to scream fuck all of you, I’m Ash, goddamn it, I move up and fold my hands behind my back, picking the shot up with my teeth and tossing my head back. I swallow it easily and spit the glass on the floor while Chet snorts and gestures for the girl standing next to him to pour another.
“I never did make it in the back …” he offers up, his blue eyes a much darker shade than Kellin Bohnes’. But somehow, that just makes them all that much more disturbing.
Because I know I can’t keep refusing, because I know Aspen was a hideous monster addicted to drugs, sex, and alcohol, I head into the back hallway and search for the biggest, nicest door at the end of it.
I don’t know that this is the room my brother used to rent, but I can take an educated guess.
I open the door to find a woman with dark hair, tanned skin, and brown eyes. She looks, if you squint your eyes just right, like Scarlett Force.
“Hey baby,” she coos, smiling at me and running her fingers down the length of her body. All I feel when I look at her is pity.
I step into the room, shut the door, and then take out my wallet.
