Love Kills (Lilah Love 4)

“Two? There are two?”

“I already said that,” I reply. “Yes. Two.”

“Holy hell.” He runs rough fingers through his light brown hair. “Holy fucking hell. And clearly, they were meant as gifts for you. This is Kane’s place, right?”

“You know where Kane lives?”

“Oh, come on, Lilah. He’s Kane Mendez. His father was—”

“I know who his father was, Houston. Are you surveilling him?” I hold up a hand. “Don’t answer that. I don’t have time to be as pissed off as you’re about to make me. You’re correct. Umbrella Man didn’t choose this location by accident, because apparently, everyone knows where the fuck I live. The victims were booby-trapped to kill anyone who tried to help them.”

“Meaning you,” he supplies, but he doesn’t wait for an answer. “But you outsmarted him. You’re still alive. You won.”

“He won, Houston, or Jay wouldn’t be bleeding out while two dead women decorate the alleyway with bullet holes in their chests.”

“Bullet holes? What happened to poison?”

“This was a twisted game,” I say, “with many moving pieces.” I leave out the part where one of those moving pieces includes Ghost. “He didn’t plan on anyone but me leaving that alleyway alive.”

His gaze narrows, his attention sharpening. “And yet you did. What aren’t you telling me, Lilah?”

He thinks he’s cornered me, but I snap back with a punch he shouldn’t expect. “Detective Williams didn’t make it out. She’s one of the victims.”

His face lifts skyward, jaw clenching, and it’s a good thing we’re under the overhang, or he’d have a mouth full of rain. And I’m pretty sure rain in New York City has rat shit in it, which is why you keep your mouth shut. His is not, but he remedies that when he levels me in a stare and purses his lips like a chick about to go at her man. I am not his man. “Williams is in that alleyway?” he confirms, blame in his voice.

“Don’t ask that question like I did this shit. Which I would have. I’d have killed that bitch if I’d gotten the chance. She tried to kill me. She tried to lure me into a trap. She called me. She knew what was waiting for me.”

“Are you telling me that she was Umbrella Man?”

“No,” I say, because Ghost named a man in makeup, but I can’t know that. Not where Houston’s concerned. “My guess is he promised her she’d live if I died.” I pause to consider who shot Jay all over again. It could have been her, but I can’t be sure. “Or, she was his partner,” I continue. “She wasn’t in this alone. There were shots fired from above.”

“None of this adds up to a serial killer.”

“Because you know serial killers so well?” I challenge, reminding him that I’m the profiler.

“I know enough,” he rebuts. “What the hell happened to poison? He kills with poison.”

“We don’t know how many times or ways he’s killed,” I say. “He kills how he kills. We just might not be in on the secret codes.”

“Sir,” an officer says, “the press is here.”

“Of course, they are,” Houston replies. “Block them the hell off. I want this area sealed so tightly that a dog in heat could be right here with us and a pack of wolves couldn’t get to her. You hear me?”

“Yes, sir.” The officer rushes away, and Jay’s ambulance pulls onto the road.

“I need to deal with the press, and the boots on the ground before this gets out,” Houston says, scrubbing his jaw. “And call the damn mayor, which is one big pile of shit I need to dive into. I’ll find you when I have my head that he’s about to take off reattached to my body.” He doesn’t wait for a reply. He turns away and starts walking, stepping into what is now a downpour all over again. I don’t move. Not because I’m worried about getting wet. Water doesn’t bother me. Bullshit does, and I can smell it, like the stench on my shoe last week when I stepped in dog shit. I couldn’t figure out where the smell was coming from until doodoo was smeared all over the fucking floor. I cleaned that up. I need to clean this up.

Ghost clutters up my mind.

Why was Ghost here?

He didn’t want me dead. He didn’t want Jay dead, or Jay would be dead.

I rotate and look toward the building I now call home with Kane and realization hits me. Oh fuck. Ghost was here for a reason, and if that reason wasn’t me and it wasn’t the victims—oh fuck, I think again. I grab my phone and dial Kane. “Hello, beautiful,” he answers. “I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“Listen to me now. I’ll explain later, soon. Turn around. Don’t come home. I’m safe. You are not. Do it now. Now. I need you to do it now.”

“Turn right,” he orders his driver and then he’s back. “Done. Talk to me, baby. What’s going on?” His voice is calm. He’s calm. He’s always so fucking calm.

“Ghost was here, and he didn’t come for me. That means—”

“He came for me,” Kane says, finishing my sentence.

CHAPTER THREE

He came for me.

Kane makes those words spoken about an assassin hunting him sound oh so cool, calm and elegant, the way Kane manages to make all things brutal and cold sound. The man could literally say “I’m going to kill you” in that low, accented male voice of his, and make death sound like seduction. And then he’d kill you and never think about you again. Me, I do what I already did to a man—just shove a knife in your chest over and over, let Kane bury you, and then worry that my enjoyment in killing you means that I’m fucked up.

He follows his cool observation about Ghost by asking, “Is Jay with you now?” almost matter-of-factly, as if he’s debating inviting Jay to dinner with us, because, of course, why wouldn’t he? It’s not like he has one killer hunting him while another hunts me. Or maybe it’s the same killer. Either way, dinner with Jay is off the table. Maybe forever.

Fuck.

Maybe forever.

Because he took a bullet for me instead of just letting me play the damn game I would have won.

“Lilah?” Kane presses, a slight hint of urgency in his voice, a slight tell I doubt anyone but me would hear. It pisses me off. I’m pissed off at Kane. Why the

hell was Jay following me around like a puppy dog?

“If you mean my bodyguard, he’s now in an ambulance on his way to the hospital,” I say. “And he’s in that ambulance because fear makes people do stupid things. He was so fucking afraid of you that he did something stupid.”

“What does that mean, Lilah?”

“He tried to stop me from doing my job and saving a woman in the alley. That didn’t end well for him.”

“And you shot him?”

“I didn’t shoot him, Kane. What kind of bitch do you think I am?”

“The kind that takes killing as seriously as she does protecting those she doesn’t want to kill.”

“We walked into a trap set for me,” I say. “It appears that Umbrella Man didn’t appreciate Jay interfering. Therefore, Jay ended up with a bullet in his chest.”

“How bad?”

“Bad,” I say grimly. “Really fucking bad, Kane. He thought he was saving my life, but I was never in danger. Now, he thinks you’ll kill him.”

I can almost hear his grimace. “Lilah—”

“I told him he was wrong about you.”

“Did you?” It’s not really a question but rather an accusation.

“Of course, I fucking told him you wouldn’t kill him. So don’t fucking kill him.” And with that command, I move on. “This is a game being played with me, and Jay got caught in the middle. Which means Jay can’t die. If he dies, I can’t kick his damn ass for being stupid.”

“He’s not going to die, Lilah,” he says, his voice low, rough, filled with understanding that proves, once again, he knows me better than anyone else knows me. He knows I’m worried. He knows that while I can kill, while a part of me enjoys it a bit too much, those urges have yet to drive away my humanity, the way I sometimes worry they have his. Until he worries about me, which is why Jay was following me around. In those moments, in this moment, I’m reminded that he has to have a human side to see mine. And all this human crap is pissing me off. It’s dangerous. We’re dangerous to each other.

As if proving my point, Kane adds, “I’m coming for you. We’re circling around to the flower shop one street over. Meet me there in three minutes.”