I give him a polite smile and start making my way past his office, sensing that he doesn’t take his eyes off me until I’ve completely passed, and only then does he close the door firmly behind him.
Unease travels through me as my mind replays what I just saw on an endless loop. I reach the cellar in no time, and just as Mr. Danforth had said, there’s a light just inside with a steep staircase and I do my best to concentrate. The light isn’t great but it’s enough for what I need to do.
I hit the bottom and stare up at the array of bottles in the room. It’s insane. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much wine and champagne. Not wanting to keep Cruz’s mom waiting, I start searching through the cellar, glancing over the labels while having absolutely no idea what I’m looking for. I’m so out of my depth here. I mean, what’s the difference between a million-dollar bottle of wine and a cheap one from the liquor store up the road?
My mind agonizes over which bottles to select. I look high and low when I finally decide that random selection is the way to go. If The Hunger Games got to choose their participants at random, then so can I.
My hand hovers over the bottles and without giving it another thought, I just grab one. I pull it out of its slot, only a soft clinking sound has me pausing, terrified that the whole thing is about to come down on me. I step in closer, peering through the gap and give the bottle another pull to hear the sound of glass moving against glass.
What the fuck is that? Please don’t tell me that I’ve somehow broken the bottle.
I pull the bottle out to find it in perfect condition, yet I can still hear the sound of a glass deep within the hole.
Without thinking, I reach in and feel around.
My fingers curl round a small, glass bottle with a cork-stopper on top and a smile spreads across my face. It feels like a miniature wine bottle. Only as I pull it out and glance over the little brown bottle, reading what’s printed on the label, my heart stops.
Cyanide.
The same fucking chemical that killed Tobias King and it’s hidden deep within the Danforth cellar.
I fucking run.
CHAPTER 34
I race back up the stairs, my feet slamming against the hard metal as my heart races a million miles per hour.
This couldn’t be right. I have to be missing something because right now, the idea that Cruz’s father was responsible for killing Tobias King is rushing through my mind and really doesn’t sit well with me. There has to be more to the story. There has to be something that I’m missing.
Mr. Danforth can really be an ass at times, but he’s one of the good guys. Apart from my boys, he is one of the only guys who sits around my council table that I can actually trust.
No. This isn’t right.
This is a mistake. Someone must have planted it there.
I have to find the boys.
I pull the cellar door open and just as I step up and raise my head from the metal stairs, I come to a startling halt, finding Ida Carver standing before me with a key in her hand and a guilty as fuck expression stretched across her face.
She sucks in a gasp and I push my way out of the cellar, seeing her intention to lock me in there shining brightly in her eyes, and fuck, she doesn’t even look sorry about getting sprung. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I snap, way too fucked in the head to even consider being polite right now, besides, I don’t really have time for her bullshit.
I slip the bottle of cyanide into the waistband of my leather pants, right in the center of my back where I know it won’t go missing, and where I know that Ida won’t see it and decide to use it on me. I wouldn’t put it past her. The look in her eyes right now is near lethal.
Ida scoffs. “I think we both know exactly what intentions I had coming down here.”
I groan and turn my back. “I don’t have time for this shit right now.”
I start walking away when her voice roars out behind me and all but bounces off the walls of the hallway. “Do not walk away from me, young lady. You murdered my husband and now you’re going to show me just a fraction of respect. You owe me a conversation.”
Ahhhhh, fuck.
Sorry, Carver, for I am about to sin.
I turn back around and storm toward the cold-hearted bitch, knowing that I’ll probably regret this later. “I don’t owe you anything. Your husband stood before me and boasted about how he murdered my parents. He told me how my mother screamed while he slit my father’s throat and once he was done with him, he did the same to her. The man you married was a pig, a cockroach. He was vile and deserved the worst kind of death. The fact that I was the one that got to hand it to him and avenge my parents makes me the happiest goddamn bitch who ever lived.”